Paul Seydor's PAT GARRETT AND BILLY THE KID - Page 3

Quote:

Originally Posted by ARublev 

After all these years I finally managed to sit through those two horrendous featurettes on the Pat Garrett DVD set at the weekend, and all I can say is they were (literally) unwatchable.  I've tried several times in the past to sit through them but every time after about 5 minutes I had to switch off.  What the interviewees (Kristofferson, Donnie Fritts, Katy Haber) all had to say was excellent, but the bulls**t camera work always made me feel dizzy and sea-sick.  Why can't we just have a stationary camera filming these people reminiscing and telling their stories, instead of this zany, headache inducing nonsense which completely distracts from what they are saying?  I almost buckled again this time but succeeded by switching the picture off and just listening to it.  These have to be among the most disappointing "extras" ever featured on a DVD Special Edition since DVDs were invented.

Oh, the featurettes. Monumental incompetence. No preparation. There is nobody on hand who knows what questions to ask or how to conduct an interview. Katy Haber sounds like she's interviewing herself, and I'll bet that's why her time on-camera is so brief, and the scope of her comments so limited. David Weddle would have been handy during this interview. Paul Seydor causes endless confusion by contradicting his own terms, inter-changing "director's cut" and "Turner version" and "preview version" when he really means "director's Workprint." They are all the same thing, the director's Workprint. Cutaways from the interviews to the giddy crew setting up their shots and editing the footage beg the question, who are these featurettes about?  the interviewees talking about PG&BTK or the videographers themselves making their video?  They didn't even bother to balance tungsten with daylight. Close-ups are out of focus half the time. The camera spins, zooms in, zooms out, swish pans, frames are staggered and the chroma is posterized and flared. Nick Redman signs all three featurettes as producer and director, and I gather Jonathan Redman is a relative who signs as photographer, but it's hard to believe they are actually responsible for all this ineptitude.  Redman has done some very fine documentaries and won awards for them. So what happened here? Their other featurettes in The Peckinpah Collection are more of the same. The featurettes wouldn't pass a high school telecommunications test. Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid deserves better than amateur night.
 

Not restoring Peckinpah's Workprint suggests they value their interpretations more than they value Peckinpah, as if he were merely an intellectual exercise instead of a human being. It is the ultimate, and I gather unwitting, insult. One gets the impression that if Peckinpah were still alive, they would not throw him a life preserver if he were drowning because they are too pre-occupied tinkering with his film and having a talkfest about it.

dvdbeaver posted screen captures comparing the director's workprint to Paul Seydor's edit:

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDReviews20/pat_garrett_and_billy_the_kid.htm

As a descendant of Pat Garrett, what do you think of this film? and the way Sheriff Garrett and his wife are portrayed? The late Jarvis Garrett (Pat Garrett's son) told me he did not like the film and did not approve of it. It made him angry, I think.

What is your position on reviving the pardon Gov. Lew Wallace promised the Kid but failed to deliver? Gov. Bill Richardson generated a lot of publicity for himself by taking the pardon under consideration. It was international news. On the last day of his office he decided against issuing the pardon, although the document had been drafted. How does the Garrett family feel about that?  You are invited to respond via email or the Private Message function.

Richard--W.

Which version and what was your impression?

Someone has made a scene-by-scene and shot-by-shot comparison of the three different versions.

Check it out:

http://listology.com/list/pat-garrett-and-billy-kid-three-films-one-mans-opinion-comparing-three-different-cutsnow-screen#comment-258990

This is exactly what I had in mind when I mentioned above the DVD needed a supplement comparing the different versions and gathering the fugitive shots.